Space Making Craft (SMC) Workshop is the primary activity of Craft Innovation Workshop. It is also an integral part of the Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC)’s focus area of Innovation and Development. SMC Workshops focuses on diverse craft techniques (like wood carving, stone inlay, rammed earth, bamboo weaving, metal embossing, etc) related to primary materials like Wood, Stone, Earth & Grass and secondary materials like Metal & Glass. These workshops are based on the Craft Innovation Workshop Model and deals with the crafts, which are primarily related to the buildings/Interior-Architecture. In these workshops, the craft participants (master craftsperson, craftspeople, craft students) and design participants (designers, architects, professionals, students) work together as a group for the process of co-creation on bases of the skills and knowledge embedded in craft and craft practices. These workshops are envisaged for a period of three to fifteen days depending on the craft techniques.

The SMC Workshops are often planned keeping in mind four major phases: Framework, Collaborative Craft-Design process, Output and Connection. The Framework consists of exercises, modules, and design briefs. The Collaborative Craft-Design process constitutes the act of co-creation by the craft participants (master craftsperson, craftspeople, craft students) and design participants (designers, architects, professionals, students) who work together as a group for a specific craft. The Output is the phase where prototype development happens through the process of hand-on explorations.

Phase 1: Framework

The framework is the back-bone of the workshop where the exercises, modules, design briefs are discussed and elaborated to the detail. The Design Brief plays a critical role in each workshop as it defines the scope within which the prototype will be developed. For each SMC workshops, the brief are developed after the in depth understanding of the craft. The modules and exercises are also planned to ensure maximum interaction between the craft and design participants. At various times, specific ice breaking exercises are introduced in order to create a bond between the participants. These exercise often become a starting point of longer term relations which go beyond the boundaries of such workshops.

Phase 2: Collaborative Craft-Design process:

This phase is the heart of the workshop and it has nearly follows six stages: Exposure and Insights, Interaction and demonstration, Ideation and Exploration, Creation and Experimentation, Transmission and Value Building and finally the Appreciation.

Stage 1:Exposure and Insights: In this stage, the craft and design participants are exposed to the field of craft as well as to each other. As all participants, facilitators, organisations come from various backgrounds an introductory session becomes crucial to create a conducive platform to initiate new sets of ideas. Through such sessions, few introductory presentations are given about the organisations involved; each participant introduces himself to the entire group which become a starting point for the workshop.

To provide exposure to all is one of the focuses of such workshops. This is done through expert input sessions, site visits, field visits etc. Through input sessions, the intention is to sensitize the participants towards various issues related to craft and design. The idea is to understand and critically examine them through a diverse range of input and interactive sessions (technical, design, academic and craft related). These sessions are inclusive in its approach and are often conducted in multiple local languages with a focus on craftspeople. In order to give ample exposure, there are four kinds of site visits which are usually planned during the workshops: Design oriented, Technology Oriented, Culture oriented and Material oriented. The design oriented visits discusses application of various crafts at various scales with distinctive functions. The up-gradation of tools, technologies and advanced processes is largely dealt with in the technology oriented visit. The culture oriented site visits aims at sensitizing the participants towards various socio-cultural issues and the material oriented site visits cover the technical, chemical and physical properties of the material considering both the scientific and empirical knowledge.

Stage 2:Interaction and demonstration: The craft processes play a critical role in development and understanding of a craft; hence the demonstration of techniques is taken as a first step in understanding the tactile aspects of craft. The interaction during demonstration builds a deep bond between the artisans and designers. The craftspeople often take pride in sharing their inherited and valuable skills amongst other participants.

Stage 3:Ideation and Exploration: One of the intentions of SMC workshops is also to discuss the role of design in craft and to sensitize the participants towards various aspects of design thinking. This is done through process of ideation with varied facilitators. The facilitators comprise of design facilitators who discuss about innovative ideas and new applications, technical facilitators who discuss the material properties and principles of the structure and craft facilitators who discuss tools, techniques and empirical knowledge about craft and community. The process of facilitation in SMC workshop holds a key importance as the intense dialogue and actions between design and craft participants anchored by the facilitators help stimulate various new ideas, process and system which is important for the development of craft.

Stage 4:Creation and Experimentation: The hands-on experimentation and exploration imbibes the understanding of material and its diverse properties. This process is based on the trial and error method where the learning happens while working with the material by hand. The shared method of different people (master craftspeople, craft students, designers etc.) working in one group initiates new discussions and fresh ideas. Also the learning happens at two levels, both at tangible and intangible levels. This process of thinking and making together opens larger avenues for innovation and development. The idea of working with the craftspeople in their familiar environment creates a natural setting which enables the design participants to learn from them. These workshops also aim at building bonds and forming long term relationships between various craftspeople, craft clusters, designers, professionals and others involved.

Stage 5: Transmission and Value Building: The SMC workshops aim to work with traditional craft skills and processes creating new opportunities and possibilities at all levels. The intent is also to nurture within the younger generations the value of the hand skills. Such embedded inheritance about the craft needs to be transmitted which will ensure the future/evolution of craft. These craft practices needs to be continued ensuring the transfer of empirical knowledge of craftspeople. The oral transmission of knowledge has a direct influence on the people involved and creates larger and deeper impressions.

Stage 6:Appreciation: At the end, a concluding session becomes important to reflect upon all the key learning’s happened during the workshop. The discussions during this session often become a beginning towards taking the craft-design prototypes and ideas forward while reflecting upon the diverse experiences gathered in the workshop. As a token of remembrance and appreciation, the certificate distribution ceremony often leaves deep memories and initiates long term associations with all members involved. During this, certificates of participation and appreciation are given to craftspeople, design participants, team members, collaborating organisations.

Phase 3: Output

This is the final phase of the SMC workshop where the final prototypes are refined, assembled together and finished till last detail. These prototypes are the examples of Co-creation. They are examples of collaborative knowledge of design thinking and traditional craft skills. It is important to make society aware about the value of traditional craft and the power of Co-creation and henceforth dissemination of the workshop process and output through various mediums like exhibitions, panels, online and print media are essential. At the end of the workshop, the team prepares detailed panels of the workshop summarising the entire workshop. Also, during few workshops monographs, reports and booklets are made giving a glimpse of the entire workshop.

Phase 4: Connections

These workshops begin a starting point of various long term relationships with the craftspeople, communities, organisations, professionals etc. As it primarily deals with craftspeople and the craft techniques related to a particular craft, such workshops are a medium to connect the craftspeople to the larger activities of the centre. The craftspeople often visit DICRC even after the workshops and work with us on various projects. They are also linked with larger body of architects, designers, professional bodies, small and medium enterprises to work on various projects in the longer term. Through these hands-on workshops with designers, craftspeople, professionals and students, innovative craft-design outputs are generated. These outputs are connected to various craft production organisations and practices to generate revenue for the various craftspeople in longer run. The connections and the resources developed during the workshop also acts as bases for the development of Craft Innovation Studio as well as Education and Training program at DICRC.

Schedule

Getting an Overview: the team interacted with the craftspeople to get an overview of the environment, skills, processes and products.-

On field Input Sessions: there were onsite sessions by Mr. Moksh Thapar regarding material, processes, tools, systems and production.

Other Field Visits: Field visits to Vadaj and Chandlodia, where similar turned wood crafts are practiced, followed the visit to Dholka, to have an overall scenario of this craft form in Ahmedabad district, Gujarat.

B) Off‐Field Sessions

There were off‐field lecture sessions by Prof. Kireet Patel regarding:

1) History and philosophy of building crafts, material properties and evolution of skills.

2) How to observe, analyse and document crafts?

C) Second Field visit

Craftsperson – Student Interaction: During the second field visit to Dholka, students got to work on lathe machines and experience the processes of turning and lacquering for themselves.

D) Off‐Field Input Sessions-

Understanding Social and Economic Parameters: There was a session by Dr. C.N. Ray regarding macro studies of craft, based on the work by the School of Planning in Surat district, where every single craft cluster has been quantitatively mapped in terms of social and economic parameters. This session reflected while developing an understanding for the craft cluster of Dholka.

Discussions on Innovation: Refinement of ideas through studio discussions with the facilitator and other faculty continued through the workshop.

E) Analysis:

The documentation work further lead to the analysis of skills and processes observed at different locations.

Week 2 (06.12.10 ‐ 10.12.10)

A) Craftspeople visit DICRC:

Craftspeople were invited to visit DICRC where they interacted with faculties, which was followed by discussions and presentation of students’ work.

B) Input Sessions:

Prof. Gautam Shah conducted a session regarding lacquer as a surface finish covering the history, synthesis, processes and chemistry. There were few more sessions by Moksh Thapar and Prof. Kireet Patel evaluating the explorations and viability of design ideas.

C) Field Visits:

Product Oriented: During the Third and Fourth field visits experiments and idea development became more product oriented.

D) Prototype (Partition Screen) Drawings:

The idea behind prototype drawings was to communicate new explorations to the craftspeople with the help of illustrations and drawings.

E) Translating the Drawings into the Final Product:

The final prototype took some weeks to complete as the work schedules of the craftspeople and students and facilitators took time to work out. Moreover, it could be observed that the way the students and the designers design a product is completely different from the way the craftspeople reproduce them. Therefore, it took some time to establish this understanding, and going ahead with the final design.

Craft encompasses centuries of distilled wisdom, practices, aesthetics, and evolving dynamics. This multi layered nature of craft, was the starting point for a two week long Space Making Bamboo Craft workshop at the Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC), CEPT University, Ahmedabad. Second in the series, this workshop was the foundation for the Craft Innovation Workshop (CIW) model. This workshop was conducted in partnership with Rhizome Consortium, Tapini Bamboo Development Centre and Eklavya Foundation. The framework of the workshop was based on the Rhizome model and approach, which was further evolved at DICRC to suit the workshop. The workshop was conducted for 14 days and brought together several institutions and individuals, including 24 bamboo craftspeople and 24 design participants. They all worked together, to develop 23 innovative craft-design prototypes (1:1 scale) for contemporary markets, rural and urban markets. During the workshop, 11 input sessions were conducted by experts from diverse fields and site visits to factories, craft villages, workshops etc. On the completion of the workshop, the conceptual and final prototypes were exhibited at DICRC, CEPT University. The workshop attracted a plethora of visitors, from design students to curious passersby to eminent personalities. The prototypes were evaluated against the Sustainability Checklist by the design participants, and also external evaluators.

The Space Making Stone Crafts Workshop (which is the 3rd workshop in series) was conducted by Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC) in collaboration with Stone Technics and Trivedi Corp. Pvt. Ltd., Ahmedabad. Being conceived as a preliminary workshop of seven days where participants (13 designers and 7 craftspeople) engaged in the process of creating collaborative designs in stone craft. The second phase after this workshop was to develop actual large scale designs. Stone being a difficult material to deal with in 8 days, the workshop was envisaged to develop ideas in these 8 days and later develop them over a period of 16 weeks. There were four main components to this workshop: Exposure through input sessions and field visits, Hands-on experience with material and Craft-design explorations by the craft and design participants and finally Prototype development and refinement by the researchers at DICRC. In the end, six prototypes were developed and exhibited at CEPT University.

The Space Making Wood Craft workshop, envisaged for 15 days, was based on the workshop framework experimented and developed during earlier Craft Innovation Workshops. The workshop focused on different types of Wood Craft practiced in Gujarat like wood carving, wood inlay, wood marquetry, wood turning and lacquer, carpentry and wood working. The workshop comprised of 23 Design Participants and around 30 craftspeople from different regions of Gujarat. The workshop was divided into various brain storming exercises, discussions, idea explorations and the hands-on working with the material itself. The initial days were dedicated to understand the relevant issues related to various aspects of Wood Craft like material, associated craft techniques and craftspeople. This was followed by introducing the final design brief which was focused to develop Conscious Collective Creativity Space (CCCS).This workshop was organized and conducted with support from Uniply, Greenply Industries Ltd., Pidilite Industries Ltd., TDW Furniture Pvt. Ltd and City Heritage Centre. The workshop concluded with an exhibition that displayed all the explorations by the participants during the workshop and eight final Prototypes (1:1 scale). All of these were designed keeping in mind the allotted design brief, the skills and knowledge of the fellow craftspeople working in each group.

The Space Making Earth Craft Workshop envisaged for 10 days, was based on the Craft Innovation Workshop (CIW) model developed for the Space Making Craft (SMC) workshops. The workshop focused on different types of techniques used in Earth craft covering clay, mud, terracotta and ceramics as the prime focus of exploration. It consisted of 28 design participants, 30 master craftspeople and 27 craft-students. The workshop was a collaborative effort between Design Innovation and Craft Resource Centre (DICRC), CEPT University and Hunnarshala Foundation. It was largely divided into two major parts. The initial part, at CEPT University, dealt with input sessions, material understanding, site visits, brain storming and design thinking sessions. The later part of the workshop, at Hunnarshala Foundation, dealt with material and technique demonstration, explorations, hands-on session, visit to villages in Kutch and craft design innovation and prototype development. The craft and design participants worked together as a group on the specific design brief dealing with interior architecture applications. Six prototypes (in adobe, wattle & daub and rammed earth) were developed during the workshop showing the amalgamation of the craft knowledge and design thinking. These prototypes along with exploration material were exhibited at Kutch as well as CEPT University, Ahmedabad.

The
Space Making Metal Craft Workshop was conducted at the Design Innovation and
Craft Resource Center (DICRC), CEPT University, as a part of the CEPT Winter
school program. This
workshop was organized and conducted from 20th November to 4th December
2013 by Faculty of
Design, Design Innovation and Craft
Resource Center (DICRC), CEPT University, Ahmedabad in
collaboration with Craftroots,
Ahmedabad along with Industry support - International Copper Promotion
Council (India), Mumbai and Rachaita Creative Solutions, Baroda.

The
workshop focused on different types of metal-crafts like metal embossing,
beaten metal work, cut work, metal engraving, sheet metal work, lost wax
casting (Dhokra), traditional metal casting, along with the upcoming
technologies. Gilding workshop, site visits and industry visits to Patan and
Baroda were also conducted to expose the participants to various crafts and
fabrication work.

The
workshop constituted of 27 Craft Participants (Master Craftspeople,
Craftspeople, Fabricators, and Helpers from Gujarat [Kutch, Mehsana, Nadiad,
Ahmedabad], Andhra Pradesh and Orrisa) and 30 design participants
(Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students from Architecture, Planning,
Construction Technology, Geomatics), facilitators and subject experts. The
craftspeople, fabricators and design participants worked together on the
specific design brief dealing with the spatial applications. Through a collaborative
craft-design process, various outputs related to Interior Architecture were
produced by hand-on explorations with various metal crafts. The craft design
groups made Partitioning systems, Ceiling systems, Façade systems, Railing
systems and Storage and Display systems.

The Space Making Glass Craft
Workshop was conducted and organized
by Faculty of Design and Design innovation and Craft Resource Centre
(DICRC), CEPT University in collaboration with the Institute of Design Expression
Art & Learning (IDEAL) from 8th – 17th May 2014.

This Glass-Craft workshop, envisaged for two
weeks was based on the structures and models experimented and developed during
earlier Craft Innovation Workshop (CIw). The workshop focused on different
types of glass crafts and its processes like stained glass, staining,
sandblasting, etching, engraving, slumping, fusing etc. along with upcoming
technologies. With the demonstration of techniques and its processes in the
beginning of the workshop, the participants were taken for various exposure
visits as well. The final stage comprised of a design project. In this, through a
collaborative craft-design process, various outputs related to Interior
Architecture were produced by hands-on explorations with various glass
crafts. The design brief will mainly
deal with the spatial design applications. As per the brief, a specific site was assigned to each group to come up with various craft-design
explorations related to development of Interior Architecture elements and
components. The core idea was to have amalgamation and explorations of various
space making crafts together in a single space with various outputs.

The International IMIAD Workshop 2015, "Conversation with
Crafts” was a part of the International Masters in Interior Architectural
Design (IMIAD) offered at Faculty of Design, CEPT University, Ahmedabad. This
was a collaborative workshop between Design Innovation and Craft Resource
Centre (DICRC), Faculty of Design and SID Research Cell, CEPT University. The participating universities included: CEPT University,
India; SUPSI, Lugano, Switzerland; Istanbul Technical University, Turkey;
Hochschule furTechnik, Stuttgart, Germany. There were 35 International and 14
national design students, 35 master craftspeople, 20 faculty members and 10
coordinators participating in the workshop.

Concept note of the workshop

Keeping the craft traditions as the forerunners to our
design philosophy, the IMIAD Workshop 2015 explored and celebrated the skills
of the master craftspeople. The workshop discussed various tangible and
intangible expressions lent to the interior architecture space through the
crafts. The primary intention of this workshop was to bring diverse voices into
curatorial and craft-design processes and to develop Innovative prototypes
through collective knowledge of craftspeople and design participants. It emphasized
on the importance of ‘making’ by generating craft-design innovations through
collaborative working methods between master craftspeople and designers. The
focus of this workshop was on five material crafts - wood, metal, mud, bamboo
and textile and surface narrative crafts like madhubani painting, gond Painting
and mata ni pachedi.

Schedule

02.09.2015 : Introductory
lectures and introduction to the workshop and briefing about the design project

03.09.2015 to

05.09.2015 : Exposure site visits begin:

Metal craft:
Nadiad/Patan/Mehsana

Mud craft: Gundiyali, Kutch

Wood craft: Dholka, Vaso

Bamboo craft: Ukai, Tapi District

Textile craft: Dhamdka, Bhuj

06.09.2015 : Briefing of the Final Project and Design
Discussions begin

07.08.2015 : Input Session 01: Meera Goradia Discussion on design project and working on design development